


Yes

by TardisTexan



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-17
Updated: 2014-01-17
Packaged: 2018-01-09 00:25:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1139267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TardisTexan/pseuds/TardisTexan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Doctor can't stop thinking about the way River looked the night she said Yes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Yes

Amy looked at the Doctor and yawned. "Sleep, I need sleep. Come on Rory, let's go to bed." Rory nodded and followed. It had been a long day for them. The Doctor had picked them up in the middle of their anniversary party and whisked them off straight to an adventure. They had been up for too long and needed to sleep. 

After they had gone off to bed the TARDIS was quiet and the Doctor went to the kitchen for a cup of tea. He thought about the lovely party that he had walked in on at their house. There were so many people there, friends and family celebrating them. Everyone loved Amy and Rory, and why wouldn't they? Amy and Rory were amazing. 

Then he remembered their wedding and how much fun it had been. He had danced and danced. And then at the end of the night, there was River. My god, she had been breathtaking. He remembered every detail - the curls in her hair and the ropes of pearls shining against the dark black of her coat. He had wanted to kiss her, to bring her inside the TARDIS and make her tell him all of her secrets. But she had disappeared, just like that. That night, while Amy and Rory slept, he had thought about her. He shamefully remembered what he had done to himself while thinking of River, probably right when she was being conceived. "Oh wow, let's not go there Doctor," he said aloud.

But he couldn't stop thinking about how beautiful she had been that night. For a very long time after, each time it was quiet in the TARDIS he had found himself picturing her over and over in his mind. The Doctor wandered back into the control room. He leaned against the console and thought about her. So much had happened for him between that night and now. Now he knew who she was and he had made her his wife. He had spent many nights dreaming about how it would be to be with her, but it didn't live up to their actual nights together. Every night they had spent together had been exquisite. But even though he had made so many other memories of her, the way she looked that night had never left him. The Doctor inputted coordinates without thinking. And not thinking about it was probably how he got it right and what got him to the exact moment he wanted to go to. 

He was parked and cloaked against the wall of Stormcage, just outside of her cell. He was watching the scanner as she made her way back to her cell and went inside, locking the door behind her. Such a good girl, he thought. She took off the vortex manipulator and hid it in the box the Doctor had made for her (bigger on the inside). She was just about to take off her coat when she heard "Turn around."

She turned around and saw the Doctor. He was casually leaning against the open door of the TARDIS. "Hello, Sweetie" she said. But in her mind, she was trying to figure out his age. This Doctor has some years on him, she thought. He was leaning against the door with a look of desire on his face. _Look at that confidence._ River felt the anticipation bloom in her stomach and then move downward. _Delicious._

"You look even more beautiful than I remembered." The Doctor titled his head back toward the TARDIS. "Your parents are asleep inside, I picked them up at their anniversary party. It made me remember their wedding and how you looked. You were the most beautiful thing I had ever seen, and after you left I couldn't stop thinking about you." He didn't move from the door, but he held up his screwdriver and pointed it towards her cell, unlocking it. "Come here, River," he said.

She walked to him, closing the door quietly behind her. She stood in front of him, looking up into his face. He reached out and took one of her curls and stretched it and watched it spring back. His voice was low, "You teased me that night. All that Yes business. It drove me crazy, wondering who you were."

River reached up and adjusted his tie. "Is that all you thought about? Who I was?" she asked, using her teasing, come hither tone.

"Oh no," he touched her face. "I thought about lots of things. Lots of very inpure things. Including stripping every bit of this off of you and finding out if you were just as beautiful outside of your clothes as you were in them."

"And do you still want to do that, or do you think you know the answer?"

"Yes"

"Yes? or Yes?"

"Yes," the Doctor groaned and pulled her inside. He shoved her against the inside of the closed door, his whole body pressed against hers, kissing her fiercely. His mouth was demanding, his tongue dancing and tangling with hers. His hand was wound behind her neck, pulling her into him. His lips crushed hers, over and over, taking every minute of torture he had endured out on her. River's arms were around him, pulling him tight. She had just come from a time when there had been no Doctor, and to have him back made her heart feel like it would burst.

After universe rebooted, Amy hadn't remembered the Doctor, so the Doctor hadn't existed. River's diary had been blank because there were no adventures to write about. But River had remembered. Only bits and pieces, but she knew that Amy needed to remember. She delivered the diary and then left Amy to do the rest. River was standing just outside the reception room doors when Amy yelled for the Doctor. When the engines of the TARDIS whined, all of River's memories came flooding back. She had doubled over and cried. She found a quiet place and cried and remembered for what seemed like hours. When she got herself together, she fixed her makeup and went in to the party. She didn't intend to stay long, but this was the wedding of her parents, she just had to go in. She watched from a dark corner for a bit and then spied the Doctor leaving and followed him out. She had been so relieved to see him that she had wanted to jump into his arms. But he had been so young then, and didn't know who she was. So she left, as quickly as she could. She had expected to spend the night alone, crying for joy and rereading her diary, but here she was wrapped in his arms, and she wasn't going to let go for anything.

The Doctor finally broke the kiss, letting her breathe. He looked at her and seemed to make a decision. He took her hand and pulled her back toward their bedroom, throwing the TARDIS into the vortex as he went by the console. When they got to the bedroom, the Doctor said, "River, sit down in that chair. No, don't take off your coat yet." She sat down, wondering what was happening. The Doctor moved the lamp this way and that, then started fussing with her hair. Finally the Doctor said, "Don't move," and he ran out of the room. River was baffled, she started to get up and go after him but he ran back into the room with a camera in his hand. He took several pictures of her.

"Okay, take your coat off now." She stood and removed her coat and he took a few more. Then he helped her out of her dress and when she stood back in her black lace lingerie, he whispered, "You are a goddess." He told her to keep on the pearls and her shoes and he posed her on the bed. He took a few more pictures, then he put the camera down. 

"Don't you want any more pictures, Doctor? There is more here to take off...."

"Oh honey, I can't wait any more." He quickly stripped himself of his clothes and joined her on the bed. He pulled her to him and kissed her, his hands hungrily touching every inch of her he could get to. Their lovemaking was urgent and needy, both of them painfully aware of their longing for each other, both of them aching for release.

Afterward, they laid tangled together. River's head was on his shoulder with a hand across his chest. His fingers were absently pulling at her curls. River said softly, "Thank you for coming to me tonight. I'm so flattered that the way I looked stuck with you for so long, that even then you were thinking about me in this way, but today was an ordinary day for you and I don't think you really understand what happened tonight."

He shifted a bit to look at her, "What do you mean?"

It would be easier to show him so she moved her hand and put it on the side of his face. She opened her mind and showed him how she was feeling - how empty it felt when he was missing from the universe and how overjoyed she had been when he returned. How lonely she felt when she watched the party from the outside, wanting desperately to be a part of it and be with her family. And then why she had to run away from the Doctor so quickly outside of the TARDIS, because she loved him too much to keep her self together for long. 

The Doctor was overcome and pulled her against him, as tightly as he could. His sole focus had been on Amy through that whole situation. He had totally forgotten about River until she had spoken to him outside of the TARDIS, and he hadn't given the events of that night much thought since. He was ashamed. It was so easy for him to forget what those that loved him went through during these strange events that seemed to happen way too often. 

He whispered her name and over and over into her hair. "Thank you. Thank you for helping Amy remember. Thank you for looking so beautiful tonight, and thank you for loving me."

 

\-----------------

Many years later, after Rory and Amy were gone, the Doctor picked River up from her little house on Luna. He told her to wear something formal and she wore a stunning red dress that dazzled him. "Where are we going tonight, Sweetie?" she asked as he entered the coordinates.

"In the year 3142, the Earth Museum of Art acquired a painting. The artist is unknown, but it quickly became the most popular painting in the museum. It became known all over the galaxy as a representative work of Earth beauty. The Mona Lisa had long fallen out of favor by that point, and this painting took up a similar place in history. There was a party held on the night of this painting's debut. The museum was debuting all of it's new acquisitions, but this painting 'stole the show' as it were. And we have an invitation."

The Doctor and River mingled among the guests in the museum, looking at the art. She had been to this museum of course, but in the 51st Century. By that time, there was no way to explore the museum fully without spending a great deal of time as their archives were massive. She had not been to the wing where the art from this era was housed. She was enjoying herself quite a lot, dancing and flirting with her husband when he took her elbow and steered her into a room they hadn't been in yet. When they cleared the throng of people at the door and made their way fully into the room, River gasped. She dropped her champagne glass in shock. The Doctor had been watching for that and caught it, handing it smoothly to a nearby waiter. 

"Here Honey, why don't you sit down," he steered her to a bench in the middle of the room that had just been vacated. "As I said, the artist is unknown. Apparently a collector acquired it years ago and upon his death bequeathed it and the money to make this room possible to the museum. The estate had no records of how he acquired it or who the artist was. The only stipulation to the outrageous sum of money was that the painting had to be exhibited by itself, in this room, for at least 500 years. I personally think the old man just wanted to make sure that in the years to come, there would always be a place for him to come back and haunt any time he wanted to see her face."

River grabbed his hand, her eyes never leaving the painting. The painting was of her. It must have been painted from the photographs that the Doctor took the night of her parent's wedding. She remembered the moment perfectly. The Doctor had asked her to take off her coat. She had looked at him suggestively as she slid the coat down her arms, and the Doctor had taken her picture. But there was no way she had looked like that. This portrait was way more beautiful than she was. She was standing next to the chair that was in their bedroom and the coat was just leaving her fingertips, pooled on the floor behind her. The room was in shadow and the light from the lamp was reflected off her white pearls and the curls in her hair. The light had caught her face and her expression was illuminated to the viewer. 

The Doctor continued his explanation, "There is some debate about the expression on her face. Some see it as the woman is happy. Some see it as the woman is in love. Some say that obviously the look on her face is naked lust and the painting is indecent." He looked at her tenderly, "What do you think?"

She tore her gaze from the painting and looked at him with tears in her eyes. "I think it's all three." 

He pulled her hand to his lips and kissed it. "I snapped a perception filter over us before we came in so no one would recognize that you were the subject. You can stay here as long as you like." He handed her a handkerchief and put his arm around her shoulders.

River studied the portrait for a long time, wiping away tears. After a while, they got up to go and as they walked out River noticed the plaque by the door. She stopped to read it. At the top was the title, _The Only Water in the Forest_ \- Artist Unknown

**Author's Note:**

> This one got a bit more angsty than I intended. At first I thought it was just going to be 'The Doctor got randy because River looked so beautiful at the end of The Big Bang' but it got a bit more in the feels than that.


End file.
